Mage the Ascension: Rule of Shade

[LadyTevar]

"I take it you know him, Stark?" Supiyaw asked. She herself could see very few differences between the images shown. They could even be brothers, for all they looked alike.

[B4UTRUST]

James was busy surfing the sites, not paying attention to the figments in the air.
"Thanks, Arkady. So if we don't know anything for certain we shouldn't jump to con---did you say Courage? As in THE John Courage? The more double crosses then a bad James Bond novel John Courage? I'd say that guarentees Technocracy in town, but from what I've heard about him that means jack shit and gives us a better than fifty-fifty chance that Arkady was meant to find that folder.

"So, Stark, you're the one with the source files on Courage, what's the deal here?

"Oh, and Boxer, I'm not suicidal. No fucking way I'm going to try to hack a MiB commset. Don't even suggest that shit. You want me to blue box you free long distance phone calls, sure. You want some cash out of an ATM, can do. Grab files from a 'secure' system, I'll give it a shot, already planning on it. But I'm not going to try to hit NWO secured freqs, not unless I absolutely have to and have no other choice. At this point, those circumstances aren't met. So no. Not happening.

James turned from the holographic projections back to the computer.
"Alright, message boards are quiet, public records are nil and the only bit the papers have on file are the initial murder news articles, no follow ups at all. Three murders, three graphic and horrific murders, and not a peep. Anyone want to take guesses on this before I go after the secure systems?"

[SirNitram]

"Courage? Sixth Degree Of Seperation, that means he's a rogue. If he betrays you, there's better-than-even odds it's part of some elaborate plan to back-and-forth rescues and betrayals that will wind up with chaos sown everywhere. Oh, and you'll almost certainly be rescued, only to be caught up in the whirlwind that is his existance. He's been at the game so long no one remembers who hired him. Hell, no one can track the guy!"

Stark grinned. 'Like I said. Officially not dull."

[B4UTRUST]

"Yeah, I had heard that about him. He'll help the Trads to turn around and betray them back to the 'Crats, then stage a rescue just to have them captured, killed, turned in or escape which involves more 'Crat involvement just to fuck over both sides again. Like I said, bad Bond plot. Jesus. So yeah, I'm going with better than fifty-fifty Arkady was meant to get it. I've heard the stories, this is just bad news all the way around if it is him. Can you confirm it is him Stark? I've never seen the guy, just know the rumors."

[B4UTRUST]

James turned back to his computer for a moment, hands flying across keyboard, windows and programs flashing into view and disappearing just as quick.

The entry into the system was easy. He had tunneled through the system and wormed his way through firewalls. The hack was as instinctive as breathing.
"Alright, I'm in the Coroner's system. Trying to dig up data now. Cross your fingers..."

9d10 = 647789095 = Fixed

[Dark Silver]

James' hacking ground to a slow crawl as he got into the file system for the Medical Examiner. The amount of data was immense, and to locate the correct folders within the server.

The folder was password protected, and it took his password cracker a few minutes to brute force it.

Then he saw the medical examiner's files, listed on his screen. Unfortunatly, the files were named oddly, but he located what he searched for.

The folder containing the homicides for the past year.

Unfortunatly, the folder was empty.

[B4UTRUST]

"...shit," was about all the intelligent thought James could muster at the moment. His mind was flying still, backing him out of the system, deleteing log files and covering his tracks. He had just hit full blown hacker paranoia, threat condition red, secret service, NSA, FBI and the Merchant Marines knocking less than politely with a battering ram at his front door paranoid.

An upload bar appeared towards the top of the screen and was shoved violently to the back by three more command line windows switching back and forth, furious typing sending dozens of commands as fast as the system could finish processing them. The upload screen disappeared as it finished and he sent a few more commands through the lines, activating the program left to reside. He passed his connection in reverse order through every one of the proxy sites, pre-set commands falseifying the logs before filling them with random data before deleting them. The windows disappeared as he exited out of them. He breathed a sigh of relief that, that part was over with.
9d10 = 0875464865 = Fixed

Once the hard part as over with he went about wiping the log files from his own system from this latest incursion. The virus he planted would put off most people. Nothing like rapid-spreading mutagenic hard disk death to put someone off the search. Of course it may just piss certain people off and make them want to find him that much more. He'd have to wait and see.

James turned back to the others, a wide insincere smile on his face.
"So, who wants to play good news, bad news? I go first. Good news is I got into the system easily enough and managed to break past the passwords, find the files I was after and get to them. Bad news time; the file folder for every homocide that's occured this year is empty. According to the M.E.'s system, there have been no homocides at all. Which is in clear contridiction to what's about a foot to my right in hard copy format. I think I've managed to cover my tracks fairly well and discourage most people's dedicated persuit. But if this now involves the Technocracy, that may or may not be relavent. So, how about that local sports team, eh?"

(OoC: edited to fix errors)

[LadyTevar]

"Why do I have the sudden feeling the hard copy is also going to be missing, hmm?" Supiyaw replied to that bit of bad news. Indeed, she was betting the only hard copy of the latest murder was the one they had spread out over the breakfast table. She looked to Arkady. "It seems Courage went out of his way to give you this, Arkady."

[Cynical Cat]

"Yes," said the Russian. He wasn't quite sure who this strange woman was, probably one of the arch-mage's associates, but Tasha seemed to know her. He would ask his familiar once this was over. "How good a mage is this Courage?" he asked.

[LadyTevar]

"Tasha, he still doesn't know me, does he," Supiyaw laughed. Both of her names had been mentioned by several around the table, even! So, time to tease the Russian a little. She stepped closer to him, her copper eyes trying to catch his as she laid a hand on his. "Would it help if I rub against you again, as I did this morning? Purr against your side?"

[Cynical Cat]

Arkady's eyes widened. He had been concentrating on the discussion about Courage, which was occurring in English and had required most of his attention to follow. Other details has slipped by him. Tasha came to his rescue, hooking Supiyaw's clothes with her left forepaw and giving a gentle tug. "It is bad manners to tease a guest who is trying to follow half a dozen different conversations in a foreign language," she said gravely.

[LadyTevar]

Supiyaw looked down at Tasha's claw, then to her face. <'Hands off', then?> she asked in Kheuar. To the rest, it was no more than a glance, a slow blink, and a twitch of facial muscles before she turned her gaze back to Arkady.

"Please forgive my teasing, Arkady," she said, her hand slipping off his arm as easily as she had placed it there. She expected Tasha to unhook her silken sari just as calmly. "I am Mandalay ... although I prefer the name Supiyaw when in this shape."

[Cynical Cat]

"Of course," said the Russian, who managed to not act like her hand was red hot and suppressed an urge to bolt from the room. "No harm done, yes," he said in false good humour. Tasha let Supiyaw go and sat down primly in front of Arkady, wrapping her tail around her paws.

<Not now> the cat signaled the shape changer.

[Charon]

Jason had kind of unfocused while the group had been talking. It was something the youth did occasionally, like he was looking past them and into something else. This wouldn't have been slightly confusing and maybe a little unnerving if Jason knew how to see the spirit world or tap into people's minds, but he couldn't do either of those things yet.

"Actually, Mandy. Yes, I do. It's called distraction and slight of hand. I could hide you from notice without using magic. What do you think I can do with magic? Though I suppose we can see just how well the scene is watched by the conventional police first." Jason was smirking now. "And secondly, even if this wasn't the site of the attack the fact that her intestines were arranged like that at the site where they found her suggests that whatever ritual that was enacted was done there."

Jason pursed his lips as James told them what he'd found. Now this was getting very interesting. "Well, that just means that this wasn't a small time operation done by a rogue or by some bored and stupid college student. The question is, why remove any information about the murder from the records but leave the body out in the open to be seen by everyone."

[LadyTevar]

Supiyaw did not have to be in feline to smell the sudden fear. It was ... disappointing. She also doubted he'd offer to fix her eggs in the morning ever again. <A pity...> she replied to Natasha, before giving Arkady an understanding smile.

"Actually, Mandy. Yes, I do."

She hated that name, and it earned Jason a cold stare as he smirked and smugly suggested ways to see the dump site. As he started asking James for more information Supiyaw walked around Arkady, careful not to brush him, and stalked over to Jason's side. "I know what you do with Magick, Jason. I am wondering what you use your brain for," she drawled in answer.

"Did you not think the pentagram at the site could be more sleight of hand? A distraction from the true ritual? Also... why would the ritualists need to hide the morgue reports, when our mysterious Agent Courage most likely did it? Do you think -this- report," her hand waved to the pictures and forms on the table, "was filed before Courage gave it to Arkady?"

[frigidmagi]

Jones looked over to the Russian.

[Russian]"Arkady, are you alright?"[/Russian]He asked.

[Cynical Cat]

"Is nothing," Arkady lied. "Just surprised. Other encouters with shape shifters not so friendly."

[frigidmagi]

Jones nodded and let it pass. If Arkady wanted to say more, he knew where Jones was. He turned to Manladay and Jason.

"Okay, Jason if you think you can take a look without causing trouble for the chantry, then go. Any data we can get will help at this point. Even knowing that they're staging bullshit rituals will help. As for whether or not the file got filed... Any thoughts?" Saying that jogged loose a thought in Boxer's head.

"Stark, do you think you could tap the suited gentlemen's coms and remain undetected?" Boxer asked.

[Comrade Tortoise]

"Did you not think the pentagram at the site could be more sleight of hand? A distraction from the true ritual? Also... why would the ritualists need to hide the morgue reports, when our mysterious Agent Courage most likely did it? Do you think -this- report," her hand waved to the pictures and forms on the table, "was filed before Courage gave it to Arkady?"

"It is possible." Russell said "though if it is a mundane ritualist unlikely. Still, with the files missing, it is probably not a mundane ritualist. If an unawakened person who is not a hedge mage is trying to commune with satan or what have you, they typically do not hide the ritual itself. Not a part of their particular pathology. An awakened person might very well try to mask whatever it is they are doing from detection... and that reminds me, I have some scrying to do. Good to have some intel before we head down there"

Russell sat down cross legged on a chair. He already had his PDA in hand, and the stylus began tracing symbols. He first drew a square. The corners he drew an abstract symbol that represented the four intersections nearest the Quad where the bodies were found. Inside he drew a pentagram, each corner holding the symbol for several physical constants. When that was done, he linked another spell to the scry

"Amigdyla, temporal lobe, release cortisol, adrenaline spikes" He spoke a command that would detect emotions, and specifically high levels of fear and stress. He would single these people out for surface scans. he tapped the center of the pentagram to activate the spell and forced his will into opening a viewport in the fabric of existence

(Mechanics)
Correspondance 2 mind 1

Arete 4 Dice.

4d10 = 1267717752 = Fixed

[SirNitram]

"I lucked out and didn't get an Advanced DEI, so I shouldn't be detected.. But I don't know if I have the range even if I head to my office to boost the signal." Stark admitted. "Mind you, if anyone wants a ride in the limo and time in the real world, it'd be a good a reason as any to go."

[Cynical Cat]

Arkady scratched Tasha's head. "Let us go. Examine murder sites in person. Feel resonances, test Gauntlet."

[Dark Silver]

It took several seconds for Russell's scying spell to function as he expected it to. The screen was hazy at first, the image only becoming clearer by increments.

After thirty seconds, the PDA screen was clear enough to make out shapes - the crime scene the hazy blob moving about, clearly stopping at a line. Several people standing near the line where no others crossed.

Several seconds later, the screen was clear enough to make distinct shapes out, and the blob was made up of people, moving near a yellow polive boundry line. Several suited policemen stood near the boundry tape, talking amoungst themselves, and keeping lookie-loos away from crossing the tape.

Within the border, several uniform types were going over the scene of the find, his emotional probe picked up only the normal buzz and hive, people curious about what happened, those that heard feeling sorry for the dead girl, others with the normal morbid fascination.

[frigidmagi]

Boxer looked over Russel's shoulder.

"Huh looks like the police are at least appearing to look into it even if there is no record." He muttered.

[LadyTevar]

"If the police are treating it seriously, they and the campus police may have computer reports, even if the morgue reports have vanished," Supiyaw pointed out. "If not them, then the local newspapers would have what information was released. Surely they cannot have erased all the knowledge."

[Comrade Tortoise]

"They may have been able to delete records, but memories are harder. We have three options. I am not strong enough to deep scan someone's mind through a scry. At least not reliably. If something goes wrong he will know something is wrong. I can only surface scan with any reasonable chance of success. For that to work, the information I seek must be in their working memory. With their thoughts calm, they are just going through the numbers collecting forensics, their minds are not on other things. Someone needs to ask them questions... We have three options. I can go down there with a surface scan spell cast, and ask them myself... you can go down and do it, and I can scan them from here, or I can mimic questions coming from the crowd and whether they answer or not, the answers I seek will pop into their working memory. Your choice, though the latter option is more difficult"